The art of travelling between Bangalore - Mangalore/Udupi

This is a discussion on The art of travelling between Bangalore - Mangalore/Udupi within Route / Travel Queries, part of the Travelogues category; Originally Posted by @400Kph
Hi All, I will be leaving to udupi on thursday morning (Thanks to the long weekend ...

Hi All, I will be leaving to udupi on thursday morning (Thanks to the long weekend :-) ). I am planning to take Tumkur-Charmadi route. I will be traveling with 10 month old infant. Is it in good condition to take an infant ? Car would be Punto.

I agree with @JMaruru. I have traveled with my 1 month old infant son from Bangalore to Udupi, and the Shiradi route was a much better option. With a child, remember that you will need to stop more often, and might require some basic shop/facilities.

If you must do Charmadi, the recommended route is Bangalore-Hassan-Belur-Mudigere-Charmadi-Ujire. No major issues with the road itself, my cousin drove this route couple of days ago.

Hi All, I will be leaving to udupi on thursday morning (Thanks to the long weekend :-) ). I am planning to take Tumkur-Charmadi route. I will be traveling with 10 month old infant. Is it in good condition to take an infant ? Car would be Punto.

Incidentally one my friend did the same trip in a Punto a week before.

Though narrower in comparison to Shiradi, Charmadi route witnesses minimal traffic all through and is a charm to drive with the surrounding natural beauty of western ghats.

Facilities wise -
With a tankful, you may not need to refill till your final destination.
For Food and Sanitation, you can target Belur and later to this all the way till Ujire you may not get clean/good options (since you wont even get inside Mudigere town).

As others have mentioned earlier, road work going on after Hassan bypass towards Sakaleshpura (shared lanes, gravel lanes). No potholes in Shiradi, but ride is bumpy. BC Road stretch is fine. Mangalore to Udupi is fine too, with some lane-sharing due to construction.

Hebri to Shimoga (NH 13), and Shimoga to BLR (NH 206) are in good condition. Zero potholes, smooth tarmac all along.

Why do you want to do Tumkur- Charmadi? If you do not have any stopovers, i suggest shiradi over charmadi. It is wider, better and has many a support facilities compared to the other.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KiloAlpha

I agree with @JMaruru. I have traveled with my 1 month old infant son from Bangalore to Udupi, and the Shiradi route was a much better option. With a child, remember that you will need to stop more often, and might require some basic shop/facilities.

If you must do Charmadi, the recommended route is Bangalore-Hassan-Belur-Mudigere-Charmadi-Ujire. No major issues with the road itself, my cousin drove this route couple of days ago.

Quote:

Originally Posted by paragsachania

Incidentally one my friend did the same trip in a Punto a week before.

Thanks all for the replies...decided to do Blr-Hassan-Charmadi route as the traffic would be less . will update regarding the road conditions once i come back :-)

If you are planning to take a deviation at Sakleshpur to reach Mudigere-Charmadi, think twice. Apart from condition being bad, its very narrow, hardly enough for a single vehicle to pass.
I took this route today, and it took me more than an hour to cover this intermediate stretch of around 20 kms.
But once you reach the highway connecting Mudigere-Charmadi, road conditions are excellent. Traffic conditions on this stretch, as you have mentioned, is sparse.
I would suggest you to stick to the Shiradi ghat route.

Also the stretch between Channagiri and Shimoga, Google maps tells no need to go via Bhadravati which is NH instead just go straight through over a narrow road and it doesnt even look like a state highway. How good is this?

Interestingly Google's best route tells me to skip Agumbe altogether and instead take SH26 and SH52.

I am driving a 10 yr old Zen with 4-5 people in it and low ground clearance and not very experienced doing ghat sections. Wonder if it is worth skipping Agumbe.

Also the stretch between Channagiri and Shimoga, Google maps tells no need to go via Bhadravati which is NH instead just go straight through over a narrow road and it doesnt even look like a state highway. How good is this?

Interestingly Google's best route tells me to skip Agumbe altogether and instead take SH26 and SH52.

I am driving a 10 yr old Zen with 4-5 people in it and low ground clearance and not very experienced doing ghat sections. Wonder if it is worth skipping Agumbe.

Agumbe ghats to Tirthahalli strechs is newly laid and is too good. Overall, road is good all along and there's a 24hr CCD near Arsikere. If you want to take NH 4, then from Shimoga you can go to Chennagiri and then to Chitradurga.

Made a quick visit to Dharma last Sat. Drove thru' shiradi & while back came thru' Charmudi. Shiradi is really good & Charmudi road is excellent. Newly laid roads. BTW any one travelled to Horanadu/Sringeri recently? Would like to know the road condition from Balehonnur to Horanadu/Sringeri. Last time when I visited it was very rough & broken roads with potholes. Planning a visit shortly. I think best route would be -Belur-Mudigere-Kottigehara-Kalasa-Horanadu-Kudremukh Rd-Sringeri, but would like to know Balehonnur-Sringeri, also any work done bet'n Kalasa-Horanadu. Last time it was in very bad state.

Drove to Udupi this morning. Nothing new to report, doable on any car now. Spotted a couple of small craters on the road in the ghats. Noise from the tyre seeps into the cabin on the stretch due to undulations from the patch work.